232 Wild Birds 



presence of objects which in the course of time become familiar. 

 If the contrary impulse, due in this case to hunger, is sufficiently 

 strong, the process may be carried forward step by step until 

 the birds come to the hand for food. With the gregarious 

 Sparrow, however, life in a populous town is usually too com- 

 plicated to admit of carrying out the experiment with success 

 in any reasonable time. 



There are many species which respond more readily than the 

 wily Sparrow, such as the Chickadees and Nuthatches, the Wild 

 Goose and the Canada Jay. The Chickadee has to work harder 

 for a living in winter than the Sparrow, is far less gregarious and 

 wary by nature, and is seemingly endowed with a keen sense of 

 curiosity. The little Tits or Chickadees become very tame when 

 hard pressed by hunger in the remote woods, and I have no 

 doubt that the following account, which was given to me by a 

 man who worked at a woodchoppers' camp in New Hampshire 

 during the winter, is strictly true. He said that at meal times 

 the Chickadees would come about and pick up any crumbs that 

 were left over or were thrown to them, and that they soon be- 

 came so bold as to al ght on the hand, or hat, and even to take 

 pieces of bread from the mouth ; that he would often amuse him- 

 self by trying to "close over them " with his hand, and that while 

 they were usually too quick for him, he had caught them in this 

 manner. 



The familiarity of the Canada Jay or Meat Bird is known to 

 everybody who has hunted or camped in the northern woods; 

 its fear is allayed by hunger even more promptly than in Chicka- 

 dees and Nuthatches. Audubon says of these birds that "when 

 their appetite is satisfied they become shy, and are in the habit 

 of hiding themselves among close woods or thickets; but when 

 hungry they show no alarm at the approach of man." While 

 his friend was fishing in a canoe on one of the Maine lakes in the 

 summer of 1833, "the Jays were so fearless as to alight in one 

 end of his bark, while he sat in the other, and help themselves to 

 his bait. . . . The lumberers or woodcutters of this State, 

 . . . frequently amuse themselves in their camp during the 

 eating hour with what they call 'transporting the carrion bird.' 



